Truth about Dating Workshop Available!

I am translating my “Truth about Dating” column into an interesting and informative workshop offered through the Portsmouth Community Education Program. If you are single and having trouble meeting the right person…or, once you meet someone, you have trouble sustaining that relationship, then this workshop is for you. Learn how you can recognize and raise your “Dating Quotient.” The three-week workshop will be offered Wednesday evenings, from 6:30-8:30, beginning March 17, at the Portsmouth Middle School. For registration information call 603 431-5080, x444.

Readers Write about Height

Lately I have gotten more feedback from my column on women discriminating against short men. The column was published in August, 2008!

Here are some exerpts:

"I am currently dating the loveliest man who is 5'4" and I am 3 inches taller at 5'7" and I used to be a woman who wanted someone at least the same height or taller, but after I started dating him I soon changed my mind....I have recently spoken to a very single female friend (single for since forever ie 10 years) who to my face said she could never go out with a small man like my boyfriend as lovely as he was. She wants a big man of 6ft plus and she is 5'4 herself and shorter than me. I can not understand why I who is for a woman well above average in height has no problem with it yet a shorter woman can't."


Her advice for short men included the following:

"I would advise any short man to play strongly on their talents, their career, think cool motor bike rather than family sized wagon, think big, plus they can always go to the gym and transform into a small bundle of muscle and not give a stuff what those silly women think."

Advice for Married Men

I didn't write this, but it's well worth reading AND funny!

INSTALLING HUSBAND 1.0
Dear Tech Support,
Last year I upgraded from Boyfriend 5.0 to Husband 1.0 and noticed a distinct slowdown in overall system performance — particularly in the flower and jewelry applications, which operated flawlessly under Boyfriend 5.0.In addition, Husband 1.0 uninstalled many other valuable programs, such as Romance 9.5 and Personal Attention 6.5, and then installed undesirable programs such as NFL5.0, NBA 3.0. and Golf Clubs 4.1.Conversation 8.0 no longer runs, and Housecleaning 2.5 simply crashes the system. I’ve tried running Nagging 5.3 to fix these problems, but to no avail. What can I do?
Signed,Desperate

Dear Desperate:
First keep in mind, Boyfriend 5.0 is an Entertainment Package, while Husband 1.0 is an Operating System. Please enter the command: “http: I Thought You Loved Me.htm” and try to download Tears 6.2 and don’t forget to install the Guilt 3.0 update. If that application works as designed, Husband 1.0 should then automatically run the applications Jewelry 2.0 and Flowers 3.5.But remember, over use of the above application can cause Husband 1.0 to default to Grumpy Silence 2.5. Whatever you do, DO NOT install Mother-in-law 1.0 (it runs a virus in the background, that will eventually seize control of all your system resources). Also, do not attempt to reinstall the Boyfriend 5.0 program. These are unsupported applications and will crash Husband 1.0.In summary, Husband 1.0 is a great program, but it does have limited memory and cannot learn new applications quickly. You might consider buying additional software to improve memory and performance. We recommend Hot Food 3.0 and Lingerie 7.7

Good Luck - Tech Support :))

If You're Single, Get Busy!

If your News Year's Resolution is to meet someone new, you are not alone!

The first two weeks of January are the busiest times of year at dating services, online dating sites, etc. so the available pool of people will never be larger. Also a lot of couples wait until AFTER the holidays to break up.

So stop sitting around feeling sorry for yourself, if you wound up spending the holidays with your Aunt Aggie!

And it's also a great time to hire a Dating Coach, if you are not sure where to turn!

More 'New Rules' for Television

Once again, with apologies to Bill Maher, here are another set of “New Rules” I would like to see imposed on television.
1. NEW RULE – Especially since the sound on commercials is always extra loud, the ringing of doorbells and the barking of dogs MUST be eliminated. Late at night my dog Sophie will finally be curled up asleep at my side, when suddenly a doorbell or barking dog blares out in a commercial, waking her up and sending her zooming around the house!
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2. NEW RULE – Yes I enjoy looking at young attractive women, but when a cable news network (especially Fox News) presents a panel of “experts” commenting on an important political issue, such as the health care debate or the wars in Iran and Afghanistan, the entire panel MUST not resemble the finalists in a Miss Universe competition.
3. NEW RULE – On “Extreme Makeover: Home Addition,” the producers MUST explain how the pathetically poor families who are given an ostentatiously large and ornate house will be able to pay the utility and tax bills for their new “castles.” The concept of the show is great, but they definitely overdue these makeovers.
4. NEW RULE – Weathermen MUST tone down their exaggerated claims of severe storm warnings in order to entice viewers to “stay tuned.” In the fall every developing storm in the Caribbean sounds like the second coming of Katrina, and in the winter every prediction of snow sounds like the second coming of the Blizzard of '78!
5. NEW RULE – Exciting dramas with ongoing story arcs MUST stop giving away important plot developments when previewing the following week's episode. My favorite show “Dexter” is especially guilty of committing this heinous sin.
6. NEW RULE - Speaking of previews, when a morning show such as “Today” says “coming up” before cutting to commercials, the previewed segment MUST be aired immediately follow the commercials, not 45 minutes later.
7. NEW RULE – Any commercial that shows a talking baby MUST be eliminated. They are not cute at all, and in fact they are eerily weird and exceedingly annoying.
8. NEW RULE – NBC MUST return Jay Leno to a later time shot or get rid of him altogether. His nightly prime time show is unwatchable. Such classic NBC shows as “Hill Street Blues,” “LA Law,” and “ER,” used to occupy that 10:00 time slot.
9. NEW RULE – Holiday commercials for a specific store that say “today only, lowest prices of the season” MUST not be allowed to be re-aired a few days later.
10. NEW RULE - The college football bowl season MUST end on New Years' Day, except perhaps for one championship game. This year there are only five games scheduled to be televised on January 1 and nine games scheduled for the week after! Along the same lines, the Fox network MUST not be allowed to stretch out the baseball playoffs so that World Series games are played in November.

Help! The 'Suits' are Ruining My Favorite Shows!

I am growing increasingly miffed by the broadcast network's (probably more specifically ABC's) handling of the whole “winter break” scenario when it comes to scripted series.
It is obvious that decisions are being made by the “suits” rather than the creative types, but isn't that always the case with the networks, and probably one of the primary reasons why their ratings have tumbled over the years.
(As an aside, nobody used the word “suits” better and with more venom than director Billy Walsh on “Entourage,” when filming the bomb “Medellin” that almost ruined Vince's career. In this one case the “suits” were probably right.)
I can understand taking a few weeks off from series so the networks can air “Frosty the Snowman” and “Carrie Underwood: An All Star Holiday Special.” And I do look forward to seeing “National Lampoon's Christmas Vacation” and Bing Crosby in both “Holliday Inn” and “White Christmas” for the umpteenth time every December.
But why can't my favorite series return in January? Supposedly the “suits” are afraid of competing with NBC's coverage of the Winter Olympics, but do you know anyone who actually religiously watches the Winter Games on a nightly basis, other than relatives of competitors? OK, the Opening Ceremonies are interesting for about 45 minutes, but by the time the Finnish national team comes marching in, I am ready to change the channel out of boredom.
Yes, the figure skating usually draws decent ratings, but does it make sense for the “suits” at Fox and ABC to alter their programming to avoid competing with the luge or biathlon events? Moreover, the Olympics are only on for two weeks in February. Yet some shows are now on “winter break” until March! In fact “V” won't return until March 30!
I do agree that shows with serialized story lines like “Lost,” “24,” and “Prison Break” are best seen when aired in consecutive episodes without repeats or preemptions. But last week's announcement that “FlashForward” will now not return until March 4 makes absolutely no sense to at all. For me, one of the really exciting attributes of this show was its ties to the real world calendar.
One of the show's major plot lines focused on learning that FBI agent Demitri Noh is supposed to be murdered on March 10, and (as we discovered last week) the murderer is supposedly his partner Mark Benford (or at least the murder weapon is Benford's gun). It was going to be fascinating to see how developments over the coming weeks and months would (might?) lead to Demitri's demise.
But now the show is returning just a week before the predicted murder, so what's the point? And for everyone else, the “flash forward” vision that they saw was to occur (writer's note: it certainly is difficult to figure which tenses to use when writing about this show) on April 29, 2010. So when the show returns on March 4, are we supposed to wonder what has transpired over the past three months? Or have the “suits” dictated that they will just be picking up the action right after the last episode, aired on December 3? The whole tie-in with real time dates was much of the fascination of the show. Now that whole concept has been seriously compromised, if not ruined.
I recently read an interview with “FlashForward's” creator, David Goyer, who said that the show was originally scheduled to return in January, but the decision to push it back until March (by the “suits,” of course) was in fact because the network did not want to compete with the Winter Olympics.
Goyer further said that certain episodes have been “swapped out” and others are being rewritten. All I can say is that I am glad I am not a writer on the show. As far as I am concerned, the ABC “suits” are crippling the show and probably killing it, as NBC did a few years ago with the promising series “Jericho,” which also went on a three-month hiatus.
Of course I will certainly follow “Lost” to the end, but I think I will look long and hard at any broadcast network serialized show in the future before getting too caught up in the plot. I still fill burned by the cancellation of the ABC series “The Nines” two years ago, which just halted production in the middle of the season, without any plot resolution.
The same holds true for another ABC series “Invasion,” which was cancelled after one season just when things were getting interesting. It is one thing when a sitcom or a drama without a serialized story arc is cancelled, but it is quite another when viewers invest time and energy into following a serialized show that just ends abruptly.
So I think I will just stick to cable networks such as HBO and Showtime, which run such great series as “True Blood” and “Dexter” in consecutive weeks and aren't afraid to compete with “A Muppet's Christmas.”

Are Mockumentaries Saving the Sitcom?

I am not 100 percent sure if it is because I like sitcoms that are shot in the “Office-style” mockumentary fashion, but I have grown exceedingly fond of two shows in recent weeks.
One of course is “Modern Family,” which I thought was just OK when I saw the pilot. But the various characters have been fleshed out in recent episodes. For many people, including myself, it is hard to get too “involved” in any sitcom’s first couple of episodes. I even remember not being that crazy about “Seinfeld” at the beginning.
All too often sitcom characters are just trite stereotypes, who never develop any unique qualities or depth. But as I have watched “Modern Family” the past few weeks, several of the family members have evolved into truly interesting personas.
For me the first was the father, Phil Dunphy, who tries so hard to be a cool dad to his three children. His efforts are incredibly lame, yet they are infused with a touch of reality that any father of teenagers can easily relate to today. I look forward in each episode to his little “chats” with his kids, as well as his explanations to the cameras.
Then there is the gay couple, Mitchell and Cameron, who at first seemed to be the epitome of every gay character stereotype. But again in recent episodes we have learned more about them, with Cameron displaying a street-wise toughness (while dressed as Fizbo the clown) and then demonstrating an intricate knowledge of football strategy after revealing the fact that he was a starting tackle for his University of Illinois football team.
I could go on down the line, as I find myself growing increasingly fond of each and every member of the three interlocked families. And at the end of each episode I find myself strangely satisfied at how the craziness displayed in that show plays out, such as everyone jumping in the pool with their clothes on this week.
Then there is another mockumentary style show, “Parks and Recreation,” now in its second season. Produced by the same company that created “The Office,” and starring SNL alum Amy Poehler, the show debuted last year and was somewhat amusing. But this year I think the show has matured, as once again the evolving characters give the series both the warmth and humor that a sitcom requires to develop an audience.
Last season Amy’s character, Leslie Knope, was almost cartoonish in her portrayal of a buffoonish mid-level bureaucrat in a small Indiana town’s Parks Department. But this season she has borrowed some of the feminist sass that she demonstrated in many SNL skits over the years.
In this week’s episode she tells a stripper whom she dubs “Seabiscuit” (don’t ask why she was in a strip club in the first place) that the lady should seriously “reconsider her profession.” And last week, while on a testosterone-driven hunting trip, her over the top reactions to a sexist park ranger produced a sequence worthy of her absolute best SNL impressions.
As with “Modern Family,” several of the supporting characters have also developed interesting and unique personalities, such as the bored intern, April, or the blustery, somewhat macho boss, Ron Swanson, who plays off Leslie’s feminism perfectly.
The fact that my three current favorite sitcoms aired on broadcast networks all employ the same mockumentary-style technique is probably not a coincidence. The asides that all the characters make to the cameras give each of them the opportunity to flesh out their personalities and to allow the audience the chance to really get to know and appreciate them.
(Does anyone do such asides better than Dwight Schrute on “The Office?”)
Thinking back, I wonder how some of my favorite past sitcoms might have been even funnier had they employed the same mockumentary technique. Can you imagine Edith Bunker defending to a camera some of Archie’s racist rants? Or Lou Grant explaining his reasons for keeping Ted Baxter on as his news anchor?
I realize that the mockumentary cameras really make little sense, especially in a sitcom set at home, such as in “Modern Family.” But it sure beats the heck out the senseless laugh tracks that many shows still employ even today.